


Taming of the Lion

by AVirtoMusae



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Abusive Relationship, Arranged Marriage, But not necessarily canon-era either, Gender Dysphoria, M/M, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Not set in modern era, Period Typical Attitudes, Period-Typical Transphobia, Rape/Non-con Elements, That'd be the Hamilton/Jefferson, Trans Male Character, Trans! Alex, Unreliable Narrator, but like, social stigmatism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-24
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-06-10 12:03:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6955789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AVirtoMusae/pseuds/AVirtoMusae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The first time Alex meets John “Call me Jack” Laurens, it’s in the dead of night. Alex is panting, her breathing shallow and frantic. She thinks she’s going to faint when Jack catches her. </i>It’s like a fairytale,<i> Alex thinks. It’s anything but that, but for some reason, that’s the only thing Alex can think.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Taming of the Lion

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for: non-graphic non-con, relationship abuse, some suicidal thoughts, and dysphoria.

The first time Alex meets John “Call me Jack” Laurens, it’s in the dead of night. Alex is panting, her breathing shallow and frantic. She thinks she’s going to faint when Jack catches her. _It’s like a fairytale,_ Alex thinks. It’s anything but that, but for some reason, that’s the only thing Alex can think.

“Careful,” Jack’s voice warns her. “You’re running out of air. Slow down and breathe.”

Alex is still in his arms. “I can’t slow down. I have to get away.”

“Then let me help you.”

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

It’s months before Alex will ever meet Jack Laurens, and the dread has already set in. She’s always been running from her fate. Her sense of self sickens her, and all she wants to do is get

away

        away

                                  away 

                                                                                              away.

She’s stuck, stuck in a life she doesn’t want to live, a soul trapped in a body she doesn’t want. She hated the way she looks in a dress, hates the way the corsets press against her ribs and crush her body. It’s torture, institutionalized and overlooked. She thinks everything about her is overlooked except for her existence.

She’s a thorn in everyone’s side, and if she were anything else, she’d disappear entirely.

“Alexandra, Alexandra, Alexandra, Alexandra,” everyone says, slowly being disappointed with the girl who is anything but demure. If she replies with an irate _fuck you_ , it doesn’t matter. No one expect anything else of her anymore. She has no expectations to disappoint.

“Alexandra,” the voice of her foster sister calls. She’s to go downstairs. Aaren is the good one. Aaren’s everywhere before she’s called, and she knows how to play by the rules. _Talk less, smile more._ Alex never listens anyway. She has words, and she’ll express them to an empty room full of people. She never holds back.

She wants something more.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Alex still hasn’t met Jack Laurens, yet she already measures her suitors against him. There aren’t many. She’s the heir to a fortune, but no man can survive the barbs on her tongue because she doesn’t want them to. She doesn’t want to be made some man’s wife. She wants to be herself and wants to stand on her own.

Aaren’s the one people want anyway.

Alex doesn’t care. She hates all her suitors and is glad none of them want her, glad she’s good enough with her words to get what she wants. Still no one listens to what she is saying. It stings, and she licks her wounds the way she always has — with more poison.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Alex hates Jefferson on sight. “Call me Thomas,” he says, “for we are to marry soon.”

He’s repulsive to Alex. He wears purple, and Alex thinks it a special combination of nauseous and blinding. Alex wants it to go away. _Why won’t Jefferson go away? Why can’t Jefferson be scared of her words? Oh God no, no, no, no, stop enjoying them please, please, please._ Alex doesn’t know how to make Jefferson go away.

Everyone is happy, happy with Alex’s panic and fear. _Does everyone hate her so much? Do they want to see her tortured?_ She doesn’t cry because she doesn’t know how. Instead she rages against her fate. She shouts and screams, but she doesn’t run.

She has pride.

Aaren’s suitors are ecstatic. Aaren’s always had suitors buzzing around her like gnats. Alex is sure they have the brains of gnats, too. Their foster father’s happy, too, happy to see Alex gone.

 _It doesn’t hurt,_ Alex tells herself. Sometimes she believes her own lie.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Let me help you,” Jack whispers one night. They’ve met a few times since their first meeting.Alex isn’t sure if Jack waits for him. If it’s coincidence they keep meeting. If Jack watches the house to see if he can save Alex.

Alex shakes her head. She wants to escape herself. She’s her own knight in shining armor.

She regrets her choice.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Alex still hasn’t met Jack. Alex is sold to Jefferson only a few day after she first meets him. It isn’t her will, and she fights it. Everyone’s impatient to be rid of Alex, and no one pays her any mind. Alex is dressed in white. A virgin. Her dress accentuates her cleavage. Her dress highlights her womanly figure.

Alex has never hated a dress more.

She hates dresses.

She hates looking like a woman.

She hates being a woman.

 

 _She is no woman.  
She’s a man trapped.  
She should be a man.  
Oh God, why isn’t she a man?!  
Why can no one see her as she is.  
As_ he _is._

 

Jefferson is worse. He’s always worse, more revolting, more atrocious, more disgusting, every single time Alex sees him. Once his purple clothes matched. These clothes are all purple. Lavender. Violet. Indigo. Plum. Lilac. Raisin. Heliotrope.

Nothing matches.

It all clashes.

Alex wants nothing less than to look at Jefferson.

Jefferson’s drunk and messes up the vows.

Alex has never felt more humiliated in her life.

She wants a hole to open up in the ground. She wants that great maw to devour her whole.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

The kiss is the worst part.

Alex thinks she vomits in her mouth.

Alex wants out.

Alex can’t break free.

Trapped.

Trapped.

Trapped.

Trapped.

It ends.

Alex is flung over Jefferson’s shoulder.

Alex is vaguely aware of the tears on her face.

Alex feels violated.

It was only a kiss.

Jefferson forced his tongue into Alex’s mouth.

No one helped Alex.

Alex is alone.

Alex is lost.

Alex has nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.

Alex is scared.

Alex

Is

Going

To

Die

And

No

One

Will

Be

Able

To

Save

Her.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Jack is a shining light and a savior. He is the only person not immune to Alex’s struggle, and she loves him for it. “Thank you,” she whispers another night.

“Let me help you.”

“I can’t.”

Alex takes a deep breath. She doesn’t lean into Jack’s touch.

She feels safe around him.

She doesn’t want that to all dissolve.

Jack tilts his head to the side and asks, “Why not?”

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

The first fist comes the night of the wedding. It hurts, and Alex shouts and yells. Another fist comes for every noise until Jefferson is tired from it and goes to bed, and Alex is left curled in a little ball on the floor. Sobs wrack her body. Everything hurts. _How could they do this to her?!_

Footsteps drift past her.

“Get up.”

She doesn’t know how long she’s been there. She lifts her head slightly, but she doesn’t open her eyes. They’re swollen shut. A hand yanks her up by the wrist. She screams. Jefferson had hit her there. Fingers press roughly into her bruises.

She whimpers.

The hand doesn’t care and pulls her along anyway.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Come on, sleep next to me,” Jefferson tells her. He pats the bed next to him.

Alex stays still, glaring at him. For the past three days, she’s been applying cream to her bruises. The swelling has gone down enough that she can open her eyes more easily now. Bruises still cover her face and body. Still, she stands defiant.

“Take off your clothes. Come on, sleep next to me.”

Alex does nothing.

“Undress her.”

A servant strips off her clothes and leaves Alex standing naked for Jefferson’s inspection.

Alex flushes and instinctively tries to hide herself.

“Don’t cover yourself. Hold her arms out to the side.”

The servant obeys, and Alex honestly want to cease existing. She wants to escape the whole of reality. Her body is so, so, so wrong, and she can’t look at it. _Make everyone else stop looking at it._ She chokes back a sob.

Jefferson stands up.

Alex does not struggle.

Alex cannot struggle.

Alex watches.

A finger on Alex’s breast.

Wrong.

Wrong.

Not right.

Must end.

Lower.

In Alex’s naval.

No.

Lower.

Flee.

Flee.

Flee.

Lower.

Pressure on Alex’s clit.

 _She_ hides.

Alex is thrown onto the bed.

Alex screams.

Alex is left alone.

Alex is made to sleep next to Jefferson.

Jefferson wakes Alex up just as Alex falls asleep every time.

Alex does not sleep.

Alex does not feel clean.

Alex wants to be washed free of her body.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Alex is not allowed to eat.

Alex is hungry.

Alex withers.

Alex might snap.

Alex does not know that Alex cares anymore.

Alex is lost.

More lost.

Gone.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Alex flees the next night. Alex is supposed to be fetching water, so Alex will not fetch water. Alex will be hit. Alex knows this. Alex runs. Alex runs into someone.

“Careful. You’re running out of air. Slow down and breathe.” The man catches Alex because Alex is breathing so, so, so hard, and _is Alex going to faint?_

Alex closes _her_ eyes. “I can’t slow down,” she whispers, and she chokes down tears that threaten to overwhelm her. She swallows. She has to escape. “I have to get away.”

The man holding her looks her in the eyes. “Then let me help you.”

“Who are you?” she asks quietly.

“John Laurens. Call me Jack.”

They talk. Alex goes back to Jefferson.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Jefferson hits Alex.

Alex cannot eat.

Alex cannot sleep.

Alex meets up with Jack again.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Let me help you,” Jack always tells her. It is always Alex who shakes Alex’s head. Alex is afraid. She wants to be her own savior. She doesn’t want to be saved. Jefferson is the dragon, and she is the princess. Alex wants to be the knight.

Alex no longer knows how to escape.

Alex is stuck.

Alex wants to stop being.

Alex has stopped caring.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Jefferson hits Alex.

Alex cannot eat.

Alex cannot sleep.

Alex meets up with Jack again.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Thank you,” she whispers another night. Alex doesn’t thank him.

“Let me help you.” Jack says this to her every time, but Alex hides from it. Alex is scared of Jack and scared of his help.

“No. Can’t.”

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Jefferson hits Alex.

Alex cannot eat.

Alex cannot sleep.

Alex meets up with Jack again.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Bullshit,” Jack tells her the next night. “Why can’t I help?”

She leans into his touch.

“Because why would you save me?”

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Jefferson hits Alex.

Alex cannot eat.

Alex cannot sleep.

Alex meets up with Jack again.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Do you love me?” It could have been her or Alex who asked. No one can be sure.

Jack pauses and looks at her. “I don’t love women, but you’re not quite a woman, are you?”

She stares at him. Alex stares at him. _He_ breathes, “No.”

Jack doesn’t look at _him_ as he whispers, “Yes. I think so, yes. I swear I will never touch you or harm you or do anything that could possibly harm you.”

“No,” _he_ whispers before kissing Jack. Alex kisses Jack, too.

Kissing Jack tastes like freedom.

Alex loves it. _He_ is Alex. He feels whole now.

It is a new feeling, and he never wants it to go away.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

Jefferson hits Alex.

Alex cannot eat.

Alex cannot sleep.

Alex meets up with Jack again.

 

 

❃ ღ ❃ ღ ❃

“Help me,” Alex whispers to Jack, voice cracking and hoarse. Jack holds him, strokes his hair.

Jack smiles into Alex’s hair. “Let me help you,” he repeats.

Alex looks at him and cups his cheek. “Yes.” Alex isn’t his own defender because he doesn’t have the options. But he will be his own defender, and he needs to be away from Jefferson. Jack knows he will be able to take control off his own life. He realizes that’s exactly what Jack wants. For now, that will be enough because Alex will not throw his chance for freedom away.

“Jack Laurens,” Alex whispers against the other man’s cheek, “run away with me.”

Alex can do so much more, and together, Alex thinks, they’ll be invincible. _It’s like a fairytale_. It has been anything but, but that is what they’re going to make it.

**Author's Note:**

> Title inspired by Shakespeare's _The Taming of the Shrew_. Plot about 40% inspired by Shakespeare's _The Taming of the Shrew_. Narration style 0% inspired by Shakespeare's _The Taming of the Shrew_. Feedback, positive or negative, would be appreciated! Thank you!  <3
>
>> A Virto Musae  
> By the Virtue of the Muse


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